Blog archive all
23rd April 2010
"They did not know it was impossible, so they did it." Encouraged by these words from Mark Twain, several thousand Lebanese are expected to march through Beirut on Sunday, calling for secularism.
The event – known as Laïque Pride – is the latest result of internet activism in the Middle East. It… Read more
22nd April 2010
In Yemen, President Salih has ordered the release of three journalists from Aden's oldest newspaper, al-Ayyam.
Al-Ayyam was one of six papers banned last May, allegedly for supporting "separatism" in the south of Yemen. The three journalists – Hani Hisham Bashraheel, Mohammed Hisham Bashraheel and… Read more
22nd April 2010
Today's Arab News reports another horror story of child marriage from Saudi Arabia. It concerns a 10-year-old girl and an 80-year-old man who abandoned her after six months of marriage. It was not until 10 years later that she discovered he had actually divorced her but had failed to inform her.… Read more
22nd April 2010
A Kuwaiti woman who killed her Asian maid has had her 15-year jail sentence reduced to seven years by an appeal court.
The woman, who has not been named, reportedly hit the maid with "iron and wooden objects", then pushed her into a bathtub and left her motionless for 10 hours until she died.
The… Read more
22nd April 2010
Education specialists in Jordan "have become increasingly outspoken" about continuing problems with school textbooks, according to The National.
In 2003, recognising that the existing curriculum was inadequate for the needs of a modern society, Jordan launched an initiative "to strengthen and… Read more
21st April 2010
Top-heavy: the ill-fated Salam Boccaccio ferry
Four years after the Red Sea ferry, Salam Boccaccio, sank with the loss of more than 1,000 lives, there are at last signs of a crackdown on unseaworthy vessels in the area.
Surprise inspections of 24 ships operating between Saudi Arabia, Egypt and… Read more
19th April 2010
Morocco's first gay magazine was launched this month, in print and on the internet. Mithly (Arabic for "gay") says it aims to give a voice to "lesbians, gays, bisexuals and transsexuals, to express themselves despite the fact that the authorities pretend that they do not exist."
It is being… Read more
19th April 2010
Allegations of vote-buying are casting a cloud over the results of the great Arabic TV poetry contest which ended earlier this month.
Nasser al-Ajami, a Kuwaiti, walked away with the the top prize of $1.36m. But it has now emerged that victory came at a price: his tribe spent millions of dinars [… Read more
19th April 2010
Here's a further contribution from Benjamin Geer on the subject of coining new words in Arabic. I'm quoting his email in full:
You write:
Take the word "toxic". In English, we can add bits to make "toxicology" and "toxicologist". Arabic, with its three-letter root system, can't do this. For "… Read more
19th April 2010
Further to yesterday's discussion about the future of the Arabic language, Benjamin Geer writes:
"Arabs often switch to English when discussing technical subjects simply because they've studied those subjects only in English, or because Arabic equivalents for many technical terms either haven't… Read more
ARAB ART ONLINE: Susan Hefuna: Al Sabr Gamil (Patience is Beautiful) 2007. Ink stained on wood 140 x 170 cm. More information | Click to enlarge
